


keep close, keep warm

by pugglemuggle



Category: Sweet/Vicious (TV)
Genre: Cuddling & Snuggling, F/F, Friends to Lovers, Marijuana, Misses Clause Challenge, Netflix and Chill, Recreational Drug Use, Useless wlw, constructing intricate rituals to touch the skin of another woman
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-17
Updated: 2018-12-17
Packaged: 2019-09-21 02:09:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17034462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pugglemuggle/pseuds/pugglemuggle
Summary: Ophelia squints. “Do you...want some?”“Um.” Jules looks at the joint again. “I think I do, actually.”(Or, a study session gives way to a date with Mary Jane, which in turn evolves into a Netflix & Cuddle session that's not quite as platonic as either of them pretend it is.)





	keep close, keep warm

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Black_Knight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Black_Knight/gifts).



> i really hope you like this! thank you for requesting sweet/vicious, i was extremely excited to get the chance to write these characters. :)

Ophelia figures that after the lying about fake study sessions, they might as well have a real one.

It’s the panic phase of midterms season, and they both have exams to study for. Or, well. Jules has exams to study for, and Ophelia has exams she’s  _ supposed  _ to study for. If it wasn’t for Jules, she probably wouldn’t study at all, but Jules says she does better in group study environments, so who is Ophelia to stand in the way of Jules’s education?

The session was good for the first few hours. Jules made an entire set of flashcards for her bio exam, and Ophelia actually managed to read the study guide the TA sent her. Then another couple hours passed. And another hour. Now it’s 10PM, and Ophelia has finished next week’s coding assignment  _ early  _ out of sheer boredom _.  _ Jules, on the other hand, is still studying.

“Hey, Jules? How many more flashcards you got left?” Ophelia asks. She’s lying on the couch, her laptop balanced on her bent legs and her bare feet tucked under Jules’s thigh. Jules glances over and sighs. She puts down her flashcards.

“I don’t know...twenty maybe?”

Ophelia grabs another Oreo from the box on the floor and tosses it into Jules’s lap. “You wanna call it a night when you’re done?”

Jules frowns at the Oreo but retrieves it before it can get lost in the endless abyss of the couch cushions. “I… I dunno. I should probably go through them again…”

“Dude. You’ve been through them like, eight times now.”

“Eight? No, this is the fourth time—”

“Whatever. You’ve got this, Jules.”

“I just want to make sure—”

“Jules,” Ophelia cuts her off, nudging her leg with her foot. “I know you’re worried about getting your grades up after—after everything. But you’re ready, dude. Seriously. I know I’m no expert on good study habits, but I  _ am  _ an expert on pretty much everything else—” Jules scoffs and smacks her shin. “Ouch, I’m kidding! Jeez. All I’m saying is, the best thing you can do now is relax, okay? You need to get a good night’s sleep before that test.”

Jules stares down at her color-coded flash cards, and then stares at the Oreo cookie in her hand. After another moment of contemplation, she tosses the Oreo back to Ophelia and picks up her flashcards again. “Okay.”

“What?”

“Okay. I’ll finish going through the set, and then we can...I don’t know. Watch Netflix or something.”

Ophelia knows her grin must look stupid, but she can’t really bring herself to care. “Fuck yeah,” she laughs, and bites into Jules’s rejected Oreo.

It only takes Jules another ten minutes to finish the remaining flashcards to her satisfaction. Once she’s done, she puts them back in her case—pink, with her name in silver Sharpie on the back—and drops the case into her backpack. Then she points at Ophelia’s box of Oreos. “Can I?”

“Sure.” Ophelia dutifully picks them up and drops the box onto Jules’s lap. “Go wild.”

Jules takes out an Oreo and separates the two halves, eating the frosting before putting the two cookie halves back in the box. God, Jules is so weird. 

“What are you smiling at?”

“Hm?” Ophelia blinks. “I’m not smiling.”

“You were.”

“If I was smiling, it was because I was laughing at you for being such a weirdo.”

“I just don’t like the cookie part.”

“I know, I know. It’s fine. You’re weird, and I accept you.” Ophelia sits up to pat Jules’s shoulder. Jules rolls her eyes, but Ophelia thinks she sees her crack a smile. “Now, were we going to watch Netflix or something?”

“Yeah.” Jules nods. “Maybe something...lighthearted. If that’s okay.”

“Lighthearted is definitely okay. Uh...what about one of those dumb Hallmark romance movies?”

“Yeah, that’s fine.”

“Cool cool cool. Sounds like a plan.” Ophelia reluctantly removes her feet from under the warmth of Jules’s leg and slides up off the couch. “I’m going to grab some snacks and uh. I might light up a bit real quick. But after that I’ll be good to go.”

“Okay.”

Ophelia shoots her a pair of the world’s most awkward finger-guns before dashing to the kitchen to grab the goods. She snags a bag of cheesy potato chips from the counter and one of the joints she rolled this morning from her stash, then opens the window by her bed. It’s chilly outside, the clouds threatening to rain, but for now it’s dry. Ophelia shudders and uses her Zippo to light up the joint.

It’s only after she’s taken the first drag that she notices Jules watching.

“What’s up?” she asks.

Jules looks away and starts playing with her hair. She looks almost...sheepish? “It’s nothing...”

Ophelia squints. “Do you...want some?”

“Um.” Jules looks at the joint again. “I think I do, actually.”

Oh. Well shit. Ophelia’s not about to pass up the chance to light up with Jules. She waves her over and holds out the slim joint. Jules takes it gingerly with her thumb and forefinger, like she’s afraid it might burn her.

“It’s been a little while since, um…” She lets out a breathless little laugh, the kind that gives her dimples. She looks down at the cherry of the joint between her fingers and her lashes are long, long, long.

“You still know how to do it, right?” Ophelia asks, just to be a dick. Jules nudges her shoulder and joins her on the edge of her bed, sitting close and leaning towards the open window.

It’s no surprise when Jules coughs after the first pull. She takes it like a champ though, recovering quickly as she blows the smoke out into the night air and hands the joint back to Ophelia. 

“Is it as good as you remember?” Ophelia asks.

Jules shrugs. “I guess we’ll see, right?”

They pass the joint back and forth in the quiet studio, shivering every time the night breeze decides to sweep inside. Ophelia blows a few smoke rings, which seem to make Jules smile, so she blows a few more. Jules smiles wider. The rings become too hard to blow after that; it’s a difficult trick to pull off when Ophelia’s smiling, too.

Just as the weed starts to sink in, she considers asking Jules if she wants to shotgun her next hit. Then she thinks better of it. That would be weird, right? Bringing her lips close to Jules’s, exhaling smoke into her mouth like they’re trading breath. It would be weird of her to ask something like that.

Soon, the joint is almost gone. Ophelia offers Jules the last hit before grinding the roach into the ashtray by her bed.

“You feeling it?” Ophelia asks, voice hushed. She’s not sure why she’s whispering—something about the dark, or the cold, or their closeness. Any louder and she thinks she might scare away the moment.

“Yeah. I feel it,” Jules murmurs back. “It’s—really nice.”

And god, it really is. Her body settles with a comfortable weight, heavy and languid, and her mind begins to drift a little. She loves this feeling—the way it tangles her thoughts and drains the worries from her like smoke dissolving in air. Everything is so much easier to forget.

“Still want to watch that movie?” Jules asks.

“Yeah.” She stands, slowly. “Yeah. Let me grab my laptop.”

Jules closes the window.

Once Ophelia pulls up Netflix, they huddle together on Ophelia’s bed with their legs under their duvet, sitting up with their backs to the headboard. It’s cozy. Close. Jules’s shoulder leans into her own, another steady weight grounding her just like the weed does, and the memory of what she did the last time someone was in this bed to her blooms in her mind unbidden. Ugh, stop it brain. Not right now, not with Jules  _ right here _ . She focuses on scrolling through the Netflix library, and soon the memory slips away like smoke into the night.

That’s one of the best things about being stoned: it makes it difficult to dwell.

“How about this?” Ophelia lets the mouse hover over a suitably mindless Hallmark holiday romance, the autoplay trailer beginning to flit through scenes of snowy villages and conventionally attractive actors.

“Yeah, looks good,” Jules murmurs. She slips down further on the bed and leans her head against Ophelia’s shoulder. Before she can think too much about it—no dwelling, no dwelling—Ophelia hovers over the “Play” button and taps the trackpad. 

Ophelia forgets every word of the Netflix summary by the time the opening titles fade away from the screen. Some woman seems to be trying to get out of some company holiday party in a quaint Christmas village, but Ophelia isn’t exactly sure what her company does, or where the village is supposed to be—it’s a little hard to follow. Or, maybe it’s not. Maybe Ophelia just isn’t paying much attention. The actress they’ve cast as the main character is sort of hot, and “woman hot” is taking up most of Ophelia’s limited attention.

The woman is blonde, sort of like Jules, although that’s where the similarities stop. The woman on the screen is the conventional sort of attractive you’d expect from a Hallmark protagonist. Jules, on the other hand—well, she does the blonde sorority girl thing really well, but there’s more to her than that. She’s hot for more reasons than just her looks. Though, Ophelia is not exactly an unbiased party.

Jules smells nice. Does she always smell this nice? 

A few minutes later, Ophelia has lost track of the movie again, and is instead watching Jules blink and squint at the screen, her eyes scrunched almost shut. God, she’s cute. She must really be feeling that joint.

“You okay?” Ophelia asks. There’s a long pause, and she thinks Jules isn’t going to answer her, but then Jules sighs and turns her head a little to press into Ophelia’s neck.

“Yeah,” she says. Ophelia can feel Jules’s words in the breath that brushes against her collarbone.

“You sure?”

“Yeah.”

Ophelia inhales. Okay. This is fine. She’ll probably forget Jules is even here in another couple minutes.

Except she doesn’t. In fact, it’s kind of all she can think about. She’s hyper-aware of everywhere Jules’s skin touches her own, as though all her nerves have gathered to those few points of contact—like filaments in a plasma globe. The actress in the movie really has nothing on Jules.

Ophelia breathes in again and slumps further down on the bed to give Jules better access. Jules catches on quick; she moves her head from Ophelia’s shoulder to her chest and settles there, eyes closed. She’s not even trying to watch the movie anymore, is she?

Ophelia stares. In this new position, Jules is remarkably close to laying on Ophelia’s boob. If Ophelia wasn’t high she would have been freaking out. But she  _ is  _ high, so she can be chill. Or at least she hopes she can. In any other context the smell of Jules’s shampoo is soft and subtle, but now it’s so overpowering that it occupies all of Ophelia’s brain cells that aren’t currently trying to remain calm after Jules decided to use her as a body pillow. Is her shampoo citrusy? Lemon, she thinks, mixed with something herby. Sage? She wants to lean closer. She wants to lean away.

Ophelia does neither. Instead, she moves her hand from behind Jules’s back and rests it lightly over Jules’s waist.

The movement jostles the laptop resting on their legs, and Ophelia reaches with her other hand to catch it before it falls off the bed. Fuck—Ophelia had honestly forgotten about the movie completely. She glances down at Jules again, who is still pressed close with her eyes closed and decidedly  _ not  _ paying attention to the meet-cute happening on the screen. They’re in the same boat, then. She closes the laptop and slips it onto the floor.

Nothing left to distract her now. Just Jules.

Tentatively, she runs a hand through Jules’s hair.  _ Hell _ , it’s soft. Jules hums and she does it again, letting her nails drag lightly against Jules’s scalp. The fairy lights are still on, filling the room with a dim yellow glow, but nothing could convince Ophelia to get up and turn them off. Jules is here, close, beautiful—and Ophelia really doesn’t want this moment to end.

She tries to hold onto it for as long as she can, but soon the combination of the warmth, the weed, and the late hour make it difficult to keep her eyes open. Jules is a comforting weight against her chest, and she still smells so, so nice. Just before she gives into the sleepiness entirely, Ophelia tilts her head forward a little and presses a small kiss to the top of Jules’s head. It feels right.

_ I might be in love with her _ , she thinks.

And then—she drifts. Her awareness fades and she surrenders her mind to sleep.

—

When Ophelia wakes up, the bed next to her is empty. She spends several moments trying to figure out why this disappoints her, her mind still fuzzy with sleep, before she remembers how she fell asleep last night: warm, high, and with Jules in her arms.  _ I might be in love with her.  _ She frowns and buries her face back into the pillow. It still smells a little like Jules. God, Ophelia is one pathetic bastard.

“Ophelia..?”

Ophelia sits up. Jules is standing a few feet away, wearing one of Ophelia’s shirts and toweling off her hair. Shit. The sight makes Ophelia’s chest bloom.  _ I could get used to this _ , her treacherous brain thinks. It’s really not the kind of thing she should think, she knows, but she can’t bring herself to regret the thought. Not right now. Not when Jules is looking so gorgeous and domestic  _ wearing Ophelia’s shirt _ , hell. 

“I borrowed some of your clothes. I hope that’s okay,” Jules says. Ophelia grins and waves her hand dismissively.

“Don’t worry about it.” Then Ophelia notices Jules’s bookbag by the door. Fuck. Midterms. She sits up properly and looks around for a clock. “Jules, Jules. You have a test.  _ Shit _ . You’re not late, are you?”

“No, I’ve got a bit of time,” Jules says. Ophelia relaxes. “I do kind of need to get going soon, though.”

“How are you feeling? You were pretty stoned last night.”

“Not so bad. Good, actually. I slept really well.”

“You feeling ready for the test?”

“As ready as I’ll ever be.”

“You’ll do great,” Ophelia assures her. “I know you will. You’re super smart, and all that junk.”

Jules smiles down at her bare feet—a  _ real  _ smile. The dimples are back in their full glory. “I’m blushing,” Jules laughs.

She’s so goddamn cute. Ophelia’s a little speechless.

“I gotta finish getting ready,” Jules says, gesturing back to the bathroom. “But, um. I wanted to say thank you. For last night. It was really nice, and…we should definitely do sleepovers like that more often.”

Ophelia grins. “Yeah. Yeah I’d like that.”

As Jules disappears into the bathroom, Ophelia lets herself flop back down onto the mattress in a way that’s probably more dramatic than the situation merits. Her heart beats double time. This being in love thing is exhausting. How do people manage it?

But, she already knows the answer to that question. All she has to do is bury her face a little deeper into the pillow to remind herself. She wants to be with Jules all the time, to make her laugh, to make her smile, to keep her safe. She wants to keep Jules close. She wants to give Jules all she's got.

She thinks Jules might want that, too.

But that's something to think about another day. For now, she's sleepy. She closes her eyes against the faint sunlight peeking through the blinds and lets the warmth of the duvet take her back to sleep.


End file.
